Breast cancer fundraisers raise money for cancer research, patient support, treatment assistance, and breast cancer awareness. Whether you’re a nonprofit, school, church, or workplace, almost everyone can get behind breast cancer fundraising.
From walk-a-thons and peer-to-peer campaigns to charity auctions, merchandise sales, and community events, there are many ways to raise funds for breast cancer causes. The best breast cancer fundraising ideas are engaging, easy to promote, and give supporters multiple ways to participate or donate.
If your organization is looking for exciting breast cancer fundraising ideas, read on. We’ll share some of the best ideas to help your organization raise more money, reach new supporters, and build awareness for the cause.
What We’ll Cover
- How to Choose the Best Breast Cancer Fundraiser
- Breast Cancer Awareness Walk-a-thons & Color Runs
- Creative Crowdfunding Events For The Cure
- Cook For The Cure Events
- Awareness Auctions
- Cuts For The Cure
- Breast Cancer Charity T-shirts and Custom Apparel
- Yoga Workshops
- Shop for the Cure
- Breast Cancer Pledge Drives
- DoJiggy’s No-Fee Platform Makes Breast Cancer Fundraisers Simple
- How to Make Your Breast Cancer Fundraiser More Successful
- FAQ’s on Breast Cancer Fundraising Ideas
How to Choose the Best Breast Cancer Fundraiser
Not every fundraiser is a good fit for every organization. Before choosing a fundraising campaign, consider your participants’ ages and interests, fundraising goals, available resources, and how much time and effort people can realistically commit. Asking a few key questions with your committee can help your group choose the best breast cancer fundraisers for your community.
Who Will Participate?
Consider your participants’ ages and what they are interested in doing. A fundraiser that gets kids excited may not appeal to adults. Look for activities that are engaging and give participants a meaningful role in the campaign. Breast cancer fundraisers often target women since they are most affected by the disease.
What Are Your Group’s Fundraising Goals?
Start with a clear fundraising goal and determine what the money raised will fund. Whether you’re raising money for breast cancer treatment, research, or supplies, knowing how much you need to raise will help you choose an appropriate fundraising strategy.
What Is Your Fundraising Budget?
Consider how much your group can spend upfront and whether you have funds available to cover those costs. Compare the potential expenses, including products, event supplies, marketing, and other fees, with the amount you expect to raise. Low-cost or free fundraisers are a good choice when your organization has limited up-front resources.
What Resources Do You Have?
Beyond funding, consider the people and community connections you can depend on. Do you have or can you build relationships with local businesses that could provide sponsorships or in-kind donations? Are you connected to survivors that want to be ambassadors for the cause? Consider any other resources that can help make the fundraiser a success.
What Has Worked in the Past?
Review any previous fundraisers your organization has hosted before starting something new. Which campaigns generated the most participation and revenue over the last few years? Which ones were difficult to organize or didn’t get much support? If a community walk-a-thon worked well last year, you can draw on that success to make it even bigger this year.
Breast Cancer Awareness Walk-a-thons & Color Runs
Fun runs and walk-a-thons make great signature fundraising events for cancer awareness and health-related organizations. Susan G. Komen Walks are some of the biggest walkathon fundraisers each year.
How about hosting your own breast cancer walk-a-thon where community members can gather, get exercise, and raise funds for a great cause? This is a great event that breast cancer survivors will want to attend. Have a few of them speak at your after-party to share their experiences.
Your group can also make it a color run fundraiser or pink-themed walk to add to the fun and build awareness. Provide pink ribbons for all and sell pink accessories.
Creative Crowdfunding Events For The Cure
One popular way to raise funds for medical expenses or breast cancer research is to host a “For the Cure” event.
For the Cure fundraisers raise funds by having participants collect online donations on your peer-to-peer fundraising website, and you can also charge an admission fee to attend the event.
Create a Ride for the Cure event if you live in an area where biking is popular. Or partner with the local YMCA to host a swim-a-thon, where swimmers get sponsors to pledge a certain amount per lap. Plan a serve-a-thon where participants can dedicate a day to helping breast cancer victims and their families. The crowdfunding options are endless; just organize an event that appeals to your audience.
Cook For The Cure Events
Since food is an important part of health and healing, Cook for the Cure events focus on healthy eating and lifestyle choices.
Though it could be profitable, selling cookies and hot dogs doesn’t align with your mission of supporting breast cancer awareness.
There are various options that will allow your supporters to enjoy time with friends and neighbors while raising money:
- Bring in chefs from local restaurants to do sampling and demonstrations of healthy cooking. Include a silent auction with donated gift certificates and cooking-themed items.
- Organize a bake sale and sell healthy-inspired goods at school sporting events or open houses. Include gluten-free and low-sugar options so everyone can enjoy them.
- Create a school cookbook combining healthy recipes and food choices to sell online and as part of your fundraising event.
- Host a farm-to-table dinner highlighting local and organic products and establishments.
Awareness Auctions
An Awareness Auction combines fundraising with breast cancer education. Along with auctioning donated items and experiences, you can use the event to share breast cancer facts, survivor stories, prevention resources, and information about your organization or the group your fundraiser supports. You can run these events as online or silent auctions, pair them with another event, or run them as a stand-alone campaign.
Cuts For The Cure
Work with a local salon to offer free or reduced-price haircuts or manicures in exchange for breast cancer donations. What a great way for women to bond by pampering themselves at a salon and contributing to a great cause.
Another way to run Cuts for the Cure events is to ask supporters to donate their hair. Everyone can participate as friends and family pledge based on inches or centimeters cut. Those who cut 12 inches or more can donate their locks to breast cancer support and awareness charities that accept donated hair, such as Locks of Love.
Breast Cancer Charity T-shirts and Custom Apparel
Hosting a sales fundraiser is another great breast cancer fundraising idea to boost your organization’s bottom line.
Purchasing branded merchandise is a great way for supporters to give to your organization. Supporters display your brand everywhere they go – on T-shirts, hoodies, coffee mugs, and more – carrying your logo and message on your organization’s behalf.
You can expand your reach by selling breast cancer merch online with a nonprofit storefront. We make it easy to sell breast cancer charity T-shirts and other custom apparel.
Yoga Workshops
Living with breast cancer or supporting someone you love through their journey is stressful. Yoga helps relieve stress through breathing and mindfulness practices and can help you introduce moderate exercise into your daily routine.
Team up with a local yoga studio to offer a full day of classes and perhaps a workshop on breast health and early detection. You could also include a small bazaar with pink yoga mats, water bottles, jewelry, and breast cancer awareness t-shirts.
Shop for the Cure
Partner with local retailers by advertising a day or weekend Shop for the Cure event. A percentage of sales made at participating retailers will go toward your charity. Some businesses may also include special displays of pink items that benefit your organization.
Promote the event through local media, especially outlets that target women. If the venue can support it, add a fundraising raffle with desirable prizes, such as a Mall Shopping Spree or gift certificates from your participating businesses. Raffles add a fun twist and can raise a lot of funds.
Breast Cancer Pledge Drives
If you don’t have the resources to plan a fundraising event, you can organize a breast cancer fundraising pledge drive. These used to be door-to-door events, but today we have safer, easier ways to run them online.
“Just Ask” pledge drives are easy and effective. Simply create a donation appeal that directs people to your fundraising website. October offers a natural promotional opportunity, since it’s Breast Cancer Awareness Month.
DoJiggy’s No-Fee Platform Makes Breast Cancer Fundraisers Simple
How to Make Your Breast Cancer Fundraiser More Successful
No matter what breast cancer fundraiser your organization chooses, use these strategies to maximize participation and donations:
Set a clear fundraising goal. Give participants and donors a tangible target to work toward.
Make it easy to give. Provide a mobile-friendly online donation page, text-to-donate, and a QR code so supporters can donate wherever they see your campaign.
Tell a compelling story. Explain who or what the fundraiser supports and how donations will make an impact on patients or survivors.
Start promoting early. Use email, social media, your website, local media, and community partners to spread the word.
Recruit corporate sponsors. Local businesses can contribute money, match donations, donate auction or raffle items, provide in-kind services, or help promote your campaign.
Give participants their own fundraising pages. Peer-to-peer fundraising allows supporters to reach their own networks and dramatically expand your campaign’s reach.
Offer multiple ways to participate. Not everyone will want to attend an event, so include options to donate, fundraise, purchase merchandise, or participate virtually.
FAQ’s on Breast Cancer Fundraising Ideas
Popular breast cancer fundraising ideas include walks and runs, auctions, peer-to-peer fundraising, donation drives, and community events.
Start by choosing a fundraising goal, selecting an event or campaign, creating a budget, recruiting volunteers, promoting the fundraiser, and providing an easy way for supporters to donate.
You can raise money for breast cancer research through online fundraising campaigns, peer-to-peer fundraising, sponsorships, and individual donation appeals.
Good ideas include pink-themed events, walks and runs, raffles, fitness challenges, and social media fundraising campaigns.
Schools can organize pink-themed fun runs, student challenges, donation drives, and other community fundraising events to support breast cancer causes.
Businesses can sponsor fundraising events, match employee donations, donate products or services, provide raffle prizes, or create workplace fundraising campaigns.
Peer-to-peer fundraising allows supporters to create personal fundraising pages and ask friends, family, and social networks to donate to a breast cancer cause.
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